Apr 07 2011
Democracy in the News 8: Democracy in Canada
It seems as if lately, the level of democracy in Canada has been diminishing. Perhaps this is relative to the definition of democracy one may have but the attack ads, the fact that the Conservative government fell on Contempt of Parliament, makes me question our democracy.
Another damaging effect to democracy in Canada is Harper’s election campaign. The Conservative party has turned away two students from their campaign-rally. Awish Aslam, a political science student at the University of Western Ontario was asked to leave by the RCMP at a Conservative campaign-rally where an official told her and a friend that “We know you guys have ties to the Liberal Party through Facebook and you’re not welcome here” (The Globe and Mail). According to the student, she has no affiliations with the Liberal party but did have a photo of her and Michael Ignatieff on facebook that was taken at a Liberal rally. The student received a Facebook message apology from Conservative campaign spokesman Dimitri Soudas.
“Awish, my name is Dimitri. I wanted to send you a short message of apology for the rally the other night. I’d like to offer to introduce you to Prime Minister Harper next time we are in London.” (The Globe and Mail)
Doesn’t this apology at least deserve a phone call? They are treating this situation as if the student came to the rally wearing a t-shirt with Ignatieff’s face on it. I find it quite ridiculous for the Conservative party to even be looking at attendees’ social networking profiles let alone turning students away from their rallies.
Another student at Guelph University was told that her name was flagged and she wasn’t allowed to attend the rally despite having preregistered. Apparently this was because she part of an Environmental Club at her school and had attempted to end the sale of bottled water on the campus. Guelph students surprised Harper with a “vote mob” when he attended their school and many were later not allowed to attend Harper’s talk “because party officials said they had participated in a protest.” (Maclean’s)
Despite being hounded for days for an explanation to these incidents, Harper only said that more people have been attending his events and that “It’s better when you’re turning people away than when you can’t get people to come” (The Star).
The news that we’ve been hearing about Harper’s campaign has been really outrageous but the party doesn’t seem to mind stepping all over our privacy rights and jeopardizing our democracy to get themselves back in power again.
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http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/ottawa-notebook/student-booted-from-event-buries-hatchet-with-tories/article1974816/
http://oncampus.macleans.ca/education/2011/04/05/guelph-students-mob-harper/